PROSECUTORS WANT CHILD MOLESTER TO GET 795-YEAR PRISON SENTENCE

Prosecutors say they will ask a judge to send suspended South Miami police officer Harold Grant Snowden to jail for 795 years in the sexual assaults on two children.

Snowden, 39, was convicted Friday in Dade County Circuit Court on five counts of capital sexual battery for attacks on a 6-year-old girl and her 2- year-old brother. The children were in the care of a babysitting service operated by Snowden's wife, Janice, when they were molested during a period ranging from November 1983 to June 1984.

A six-member jury deliberated for an hour and 15 minutes before returning the guilty verdict.

Prosecutors Howard Pohl and David Markus said they would ask Judge Amy Steele Donner to impose a maximum sentence of 795 years in prison on Snowden, to be served consecutively so he will never get out of jail.

Markus said the state attorney's office would have had a "different attitude toward the sentencing" had Snowden entered a guilty plea and sought treatment.

The sentences, if approved by the judge, would include five mandatory life terms that carry minimum sentences of 25 years in prison without possibility of parole.

Donner has scheduled sentencing for April 17. She ordered a pre-sentence investigation of Snowden and said it would help determine whether the sentences will be imposed concurrently or consecutively.

Snowden is also scheduled to be tried for molesting two other children. He was acquitted last year of charges he molested a 4-year-old girl in 1977.

South Miami Police Chief Hank Selsky suspended Snowden from the force after he was arrested in September 1984. Selsky said Snowden would be fired.